Full Body Scan And Mountain Practice

Shelly Tygielski leads free meditation classes on Hollywood Beach every Sunday morning to a community of 15,000 meditators who call themselves the "Sand Tribe." This is a 25-minute high quality live recording from "Broward Meditates" program, held at the Broward Center of the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale, September 2016. This practice was held in front of 800 meditators and was the largest mass meditation in South Florida history. This practice includes breathing techniques, a full body scan and mountain meditation. This practice allows you to enjoy the sensations of release, liberation and empowerment of the mind and soul. Feel yourself become immersed in the soft and powerful words spoken by Shelly, as you let your muscles relax into a relieved state of stillness and measured calm.

Transcript

During this relaxation,

You will be tensing various muscles throughout your body.

Please do this without straining.

You do not need to exert yourself.

Just contract each muscle firmly but gently as you breathe in.

If you feel uncomfortable at any time,

You can simply relax and breathe normally.

First,

Bring awareness to your feet and toes.

Breathe in deeply through your nose and as you do,

Gradually curl your toes down and tense the muscles in the soles of your feet.

Hold your breath for just a few seconds and release,

Letting your muscles in your feet go limp as you breathe out.

Feel the tension in your feet wash away as you exhale.

Notice how different your feet feel when tensed and when they are relaxed.

Take another deep breath in again through your nose,

Tensing the muscles in your soles of your feet and holding this position for a few seconds.

Now release.

Feel yourself relaxing more and more deeply with each breath.

Your whole body is becoming heavier,

Softer,

And more relaxed as each moment passes.

Now bring awareness to your lower legs,

To your calf muscles.

As you draw in a nice deep breath,

Point your toes up towards your knees and tighten these muscles.

Hold for just a moment and then let those muscles go limp as you exhale.

Feel your muscles relax and feel the tension washing away with your out breath.

Taking a deep breath in again,

Tense the muscles in your thighs and hold for just a moment and then release everything.

As you do this,

The blood flow to your muscles increases and you may notice a warm,

Tingling sensation.

Enjoy this feeling of soothing relaxation in your thighs.

Next draw in a nice deep breath again,

Gradually tighten the muscles where your bottom meets your seat and hold this contraction for a few seconds and release your breath.

Feel the tension leaving your muscles and feel them relaxing completely.

Enjoy the sensation of release as you become even more deeply relaxed.

Now moving along and bringing awareness to your stomach,

Drawing in a nice deep breath and tightening the muscles.

Imagine that you are trying to touch your belly button to your spine.

Now release your breath and let your muscles relax.

Release the sensation of relief that comes from letting go.

Bring your awareness now to the muscles in your back.

As you slowly breathe in,

Arch your back slightly and tighten those muscles.

Now release your breath and let your muscles relax.

Now give your attention to your shoulder muscles and your neck muscles.

And as you draw in a nice deep breath,

Pull your shoulders up towards your ears and squeeze these muscles firmly.

Now breathe out completely and allow your contracted muscles to go loose and limp.

And feel the tension subside as you relax and breathe out.

Feel the heaviness in your body now.

Enjoy the feeling.

Feel yourself becoming heavier and heavier.

Feel yourself becoming more and more deeply relaxed.

Feeling that you are calm,

You are secure,

You are at peace.

Now it's time to let go of all the tension in your arms and hands,

Starting with your upper arms.

As you breathe in,

Raise your wrist towards your shoulders and tighten the muscles in your upper arms.

Hold that breath and that contraction for just a moment.

And then gently lower your arms and breathe all the way out.

You may feel warm burning sensation in your muscles when you tighten them.

Just feel how relaxing it is to release that tightness and to breathe away all tension.

Now bring awareness to your forearms.

And as you breathe in,

Curl your hands inwards as though you are trying to touch the inside of your elbows with your fingertips.

Feel the tension subside as you slowly begin to breathe out and relax.

Now taking another deep breath in and tightly clenching your fists,

Really holding that position.

Feel the throbbing in your fist.

When you have finished breathing in,

Hold for just a few seconds and release.

Releasing any feelings of buzzing or throbbing as your hands become soft and relaxed.

Your arms and hands are feeling heavy and relaxed.

Take a couple of nice slow breaths now and just relax.

Feel yourself slipping even deeper into a state of complete rest.

Now bringing awareness to the muscles in your face.

Tighten the muscles in your face by squeezing your eyes shut and clenching your lips together as hard as you can.

And as you do this,

Breathe in fully holding it.

And when you're ready,

Breathe out and relax all your facial muscles,

Feeling your face softening.

Now bring awareness to the muscles in your jaw.

And when you take a deep breath in,

Open your mouth as wide as you can.

Feel your jaw muscles stretching and tightening.

And exhale,

Allowing your mouth to gently close.

You are now completely relaxed from the tips of your toes to the top of your head.

Just sit here for a moment,

Listening to the sound of your breathing and enjoying the lovely and warm sensation of physical relaxation.

And from this position,

You will begin a visualization with your completely healed self and your completely relaxed self,

Allowing the body to be still and sitting with a sense of dignity,

A sense of resolve,

A sense of being complete,

Whole in this very moment with your posture reflecting the sense of wholeness.

And as you sit here,

Letting an image form in your mind's eye of the most magnificent or beautiful mountain you know or have seen or can imagine,

Letting it gradually come into greater focus.

And even if it doesn't come to you as a visual image,

Allow the sense of this mountain and feeling its overall shape,

Its lofty peak or peaks high in the sky,

The large base rooted in the bedrock of the earth's crust,

Its steep or gently sloping sides.

Who knows how massive it is,

How solid,

How unmoving,

How beautiful,

Whether from up far or from up close.

Perhaps your mountain has snow blanketing its tops and trees reaching down to the base or rugged granite sides.

There may be streams and waterfalls cascading down the slopes.

There may be one peak or a series of peaks or meadows and high lakes.

Observing it,

Noting its qualities,

And when you feel ready,

See if you can bring this mountain into your own body sitting here so that your body and the mountain in your mind's eye become one.

And as you sit here,

You share in the massiveness and the stillness and majesty of the mountain and you become the mountain.

Located in the sitting posture,

Your head becomes the lofty peak supported by the rest of the body and affording a panoramic view.

Your shoulders and your arms,

The side of the mountain,

Your bottom and legs,

The solid base rooted to the cushion of your chair,

Experiencing in your body a sense of uplift from deep within your pelvis and spine.

And with each breath,

As you continue sitting,

Becoming a little more a breathing mountain,

Alive and vital,

Yet unwavering in your inner stillness,

Completely what you are,

Beyond words and thought,

A centered,

Grounded,

Unmoving presence.

As you sit here,

Become aware of the fact that the sun travels across the sky,

The light and shadows and colors are changing virtually moment by moment in the mountain stillness,

And the surface teams with life and activity,

Streams melting,

Waterfalls,

Plants and wildlife.

And as the mountain sits,

Seeing and feeling how night follows day and day follows night,

The bright warming sun followed by the cool night sky studded with stars and the gradual dawning of a new day.

Through it all,

The mountain just sits,

Experiencing change in each moment,

Constantly changing,

It always just being itself.

It remains still as the seasons flow into one another,

And as the weather changes moment by moment and day by day,

Calmness abiding all change.

In summer,

There is no snow on the mountain,

Except perhaps for the very peaks and crags shielded from direct sunlight.

And in the fall,

The mountain may wear a coat of brilliant fire colors,

And in the winter,

A blanket of snow and of ice.

And in any season,

It may find itself at times enshrouded in clouds or fog pelted by freezing rain.

People may come to see the mountain and comment on how beautiful it is,

Or how it's not a good day to see the mountain.

That it's too cloudy or rainy or foggy or dark.

This matters to the mountain,

Which remains at all times its essential self.

Clouds may come,

Clouds may go,

Tourists may like it or not.

The mountain's magnificence and beauty are not changed one bit by whether people see it or not,

Seen or unseen.

In sun or clouds,

Broiling or frigid,

Day or night,

The mountain just sits,

Being itself.

And at times visited by violent storms,

Buffeted by snow and rain and the winds of unthinkable magnitude and through it all,

The mountain sits.

In spring comes,

Trees leaf out and flowers bloom in the high meadows and slopes,

Birds sing in the trees once again and streams overflow with the waters of melting snow.

And through it all,

The mountain sits.

Unmoved by the weather,

By what happens on the surface,

By the world of appearances,

Remaining its essential self through the seasons,

The changing weather,

The activity ebbing and flowing on its surface.

In the same way as we sit in meditation,

We can learn to experience the mountain.

We can embody the same central unwavering stillness and groundness in the face of everything that changes in our own lives,

Over seconds,

Over hours,

Over years.

In our lives and in our meditation practice,

We experience constantly the changing nature of mind and body and of the outer world.

We have our own periods of light and of darkness,

Activity and inactivity,

Our moments of color and our moments of darkness.

And it's true that we experience storms of varying intensity and violence in the outer world and in our own minds and bodies.

Buffeted by high winds,

By cold rain,

We endure periods of darkness and pain,

Moments of joy and uplift.

Even our appearance changes constantly,

Experiencing a weather of its own.

And by becoming the mountain in our meditation practice,

We link up with its strength and stability and adopt them for our own.

We can use its energy to support our energy,

To encounter each moment with mindfulness and equanimity and clarity.

It may help us to see that our thoughts and our feelings,

Our preoccupations,

Our emotional storms and crises,

Even the things that happen to us,

Are very much like the weather on the mountain.

We tend to take it personally,

But its strongest characteristics are impersonal.

The weather of our lives cannot be ignored or denied.

They'll be encountered,

Honored,

Felt and held in awareness.

And in holding it in this way,

We come to know a deeper silence and stillness and wisdom.

Mountains have this to teach us,

And much more,

If we let it in.

So if you find that you resonate in some way with the strength and stability of the mountain in your sitting,

Use it from time to time in your meditation practice to remind you of what it means to sit mindfully with resolve and with wakefulness and stillness.

So in the time that remains,

Continuing to sustain the mountain meditation on your own in silence,

Moment by moment appreciating the feeling of being grounded.

Coming back to your awareness,

Feeling that you're relaxed and that your energy has been revitalized.

Feel that your spirit is fresh,

Your mind is clear,

And you're looking forward to what is to come.

Become conscious of your breath.

You have now been cleansed and feel invigorated.

You can wiggle your toes,

Wiggle your fingers,

Adjust your position,

And slowly open your eyes,

And feel free to just sit in the space for a minute in complete silence,

Focusing on your breathing and how relaxed you feel.

Thank you.

Reviews

Thank you

Love! Nice progressive muscle relaxation to begin, then beautiful, well paced guided imagery.

Love the muscle relax exercise. At the mountain part I think I fell a sleep because of it :)

It is amazing meditation thank you so much Shelly for such awesome work

Shelly. One of the best Mountain meditations I have ever done. Thank you and so glad you found your way on to insight timer. ❤️ Heather (from the Sand Tribe).

AWESOME!! ☺️ thank you 💗

Thank you, I really needed to relax, I fell asleep at the end too 🙏🏻

Beginning a little hard for one who suffers chronic pain, but the mountain visualization really helped gain both relaxation to a point and gratitude for peace within no matter the storms outside

I listened to this lying down in bed this morning, was very relaxing after a restless night, good visualization, thankyou 🙏🏼

Spectacular meditation 🧘‍♀️. Loved every minute of it especially the mountain philosophy at the end. Blessed to have found this and look forward to the many more promised. Thanks 🙏

Thank you for this gift. So beautiful and grounding. Xxxoo

Very soothing relaxation

Beautiful visualization of the mountain along with the analogy of our lives. Thank you🙏🌹